Stuff Only Louisianians May Know - Isaac Wed 10:30

So it is Wed Aug 29 ar 10:30 am.  It appears that Isaac is finally beginning to move a bit inland.  And the eye is heading straight for us!  LOL.

I am going to post this and add video later, I can't seem to get blogger to add my video of the wind now.  It has picked up considerably and we are not at about 39 mph.  They eye is over Houma right now.  There is a nice quilt shop in Houma!

The wind is picking up, even Charlene notices that over in Lafayette.  We lost electricity for about 20 minutes, and the rain is beginning to come in a steady fall.

Let me tell you some things that we know here in Louisiana.  I guess everyone knows that today is exactly 7 years from the date Katrina hit.  How interesting.    The exact same area.  I hope this does not become a thing every 7 years!  Frank and I both grew up in New Orleans and both of our sets of parents did as well.  So we have lots of family history there.

Currently, New Orleans is not flooding.  New Orleans would not have flooded during Katrina.  What happened was the levees were breached.  Why?

It was Bush's fault!  No, not really, it was the Mardi Gras men.

The Federal Government had been giving the Levee Boards millions each year for many years, since the 30's for maintance and construtuion of the levee system.  Over time the politicians began to appoint their friends to the Levee Boards.  In time they began to move the money into their pockets, pet projects and who knows where, rather than maintain or construct new levees.  We all knew the Levee Boards were a joke.  And so were the levees.

So when Katrina hit, many of the levees had not been maintained.  And since New Orelans substrate land is still compressing (sinking) they were well below the required levels.

Hence flooding.

So rather then punish the people who did all this, since they are all friends anyway, the Federal Government decided to pour $14.5 Billion into New Orleans levees.  We thought that was a joke as well.  With $14.5 BILLION we could have built a new city, cleaned out the old welfare state and actually had a Houston or an Austin here in Louisiana.  So few people actually lived in New Orleans who worked and had family units.  Most live in Metairie, Kenner, River Ridge, Harahan, Westwego, etc, communities that all are squeezed in there around New Orleans.  The welfare checks supported more than 89% of the people who actually lived in New Orleans.    Amazing.

A side note about Houston.  Years ago, when the power people wanted to create a power city in the South, they approached the bigwigs in New Orleans about the idea of creating an oil city.  The money and power is concentrated in these Mardi Gras Krewes.  They are the men who control this city and the state.  They vetoed the idea thinking that they would lose the culture of their Krewes as the city became a power center and outsiders came in.  So the brokers moved to Houston and created wealth there.

And Louisiana was happy and we still had our Mardi Gras men.